Thursday, May 19, 2011

Spring Chicks

The primary classes in my school are hatching chicks this year. I wanted to do a lesson on foreground, middleground and background so I used chicks as the theme.

The first part of the lesson was showing the kids where the foreground, middleground and background in a picture are. Then we discussed how images up close in the foreground will appear larger and will have more detail. In the middleground we discussed how the objects would be smaller then those in the foreground and smaller yet and with much less detail in the background.

I had the kids draw two lines (for the rolling hills). I had them measure one hand from bottom to tip of their finger to show where to start the first hill. After drawing it in pencil they traced over the lines in black marker.

Next they were to draw at least two large chicks in the foregound. To draw the chick I told them to either draw and egg or a watermelon slice for the body, next put a head, beak and legs on it. They traced the chicks in black marker. We discussed the texture of a chick. How the feathers feel... what they look like. I showed them how a piece of torn construction paper looks feathery around the outside rather then blunt when it is cut. The kids used little pieces of torn yellow construction paper to completely cover the chicks in the foreground. The effect is great! We talked again about how objects closer to thme in the foreground would have more visible detail. They coloured the beak in orange and used black marker for the eyes.

Next, they drew chicks in the middleground. The chicks had to be smaller and were coloured in (pushing hard) with pencil crayon. The kids were then to colour the hills lightly with green pencil crayon.

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For the chicks in the background, the kids used paint. The dipped one finger in yellow paint and used a fingerprint for the body and then used their pinky finger for the heads.

After the paint had dried, they used a black marker to draw eyes, beaks, and feet. They drew and coloured in clouds. Such cute little pictures and lots of learning too :)